154 evacuated from IndiGo plane after smoke causes panic

Thick smoke billowing out from the underside of an IndiGo plane while landing at Delhi airport with 154 people on-board prompted a quick evacuation resulting in 28 passengers suffering injuries.

One of the passengers suffered a fracture while others escaped with minor injuries in the evacuation process. The smoke is believed to have been caused by technical problems in the landing gear, resulting in thick smoke emanating from the plane after landing.

This is the second such incident involving an IndiGo plane in five months. An IndiGo flight from Delhi had caught fire while landing at Kathmandu airport on March 8 but no one was injured.

That time too, the problem was in the landing gear. As the Airbus A-320 from Mumbai landed at the IGI Airport at 3:35 PM, the Air Traffic Control observed “dense smoke” coming out of the left-side lower portion and alerted the pilots following which the plane was moved to the taxiway.

All passengers were evacuated through the emergency slide-chutes on the right side and one on the left side of the plane in “approximately 75 seconds, IndiGo said in a statement.
IndiGo claimed that only nine passengers suffered “minor injuries like bruises which can happen while sliding down the chute”.  “One passenger unfortunately suffered a fracture and all were taken for urgent medical attention,” it said.

Probe on

The officials of Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) at the airport and airline engineers have started investigating the incident, sources said.

There were 148 passengers, including an infant, and six crew members on-board when the incident took place. The airline claimed that the plane made a normal landing at the airport and emphasised that “there was no fire and it was not an emergency or priority landing”.

“Some of the passengers who suffered minor injuries during evacuation were given medical attention and taken care of by our airport team as well as five members of our FAC (Family Assistance and Care) team members. They have all left for their homes already,” the airline statement said.